


we'll get charged out in the rain

by hikaru



Category: Code Name Verity - Elizabeth Wein
Genre: Gen, Misses Clause Challenge, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:51:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hikaru/pseuds/hikaru
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>...I know what I'm talking about when I describe what it was like for Maddie to be alone at the top of the world, deafened by the roar of four winds and two cylinders, with all the Cheshire plain and its green fields and red chimneys thrown at her feet like a tartan picnic blanket.</i>
</p><p>A weekend in Stockport.</p>
            </blockquote>





	we'll get charged out in the rain

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fenella](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fenella/gifts).



Maddie’s packing an overnight bag and I swear, I’ve never seen anyone look so despondent over getting a few days’ leave. You’d think she was being drummed out of the ATA, with how glum she looks.

“Cheer up, Brodatt.” It’s not quite a demand, but Maddie plasters a smile on her face nonetheless. I did ask nicely, after all. “It’s not like you’re grounded forever. It’s just ‘til this storm passes.”

“I know,” she says, looking up at me from the jumper she’s trying to stuff in the bag. It’s folded in a way that says it _should_ come out wrinkle-free but probably won’t. And as Maddie will tell you, wrinkles aren’t regulation, and she does try ever so hard to be _regulation_. “I should be happy to have a few days off, but...” Her voice trails off and she sighs heavily. Maddie gives up on neatly packing the jumper and just pushes it inside to be done with it, then sits heavily on the bed. “I was looking forward to being up in the air this weekend.”

If there’s anything that can make Maddie despondent -- even more so than getting a _look_ from a commanding officer over a few tendrils of hair out of place -- it’s being grounded from flight, whether because of weather or any other reason. I’ve one ace in my pocket for this conversation to cheer maddie up the best I can, and now I put it into play. “You know,” I say slowly, taking time to draw out the idea. I look down at a piece of lint on my shirt and act casual, as if the idea just occurred to me. “I’ve got a few days off, too, thanks to this absurd weather.” I hear the creak of springs and flick my gaze up just enough to see Maddie twist on the bed to look over at me. “Fancy a houseguest for a few days at Brodatt Manor?”

She laughs despite herself. I may have had the good fortune to be born into a castle with a proper name and a ghost and everything, but there’s no reason why Maddie’s somewhat more humble abode shouldn’t get a name and a story of its own, too.

“I suppose.” She draws the words out, contemplating all of the different ways this scenario could play out. Always too analytical for her own good, that’s our Maddie. I know what she’s thinking: will her grandparents mnd, will there be enough supplies, will I be quietly judging the home she’s lived in her entire life? (I wouldn’t, but she worries.) “We might have to put you to work, though.”

“As long as no one sends me on my own to market.” We both know precisely how wretched an idea that would be.

“Never.” She’s emphatic. She knows me too well.

*

It’s just as dreary in Stockport as I’d expected. It’s nothing that we’re not used to, but admittedly I had this vision of the fog clearing for just the briefest of moments, the sun shining bright and proud as we arrived at the front door of Maddie’s little brick house. No such thing happened, but a girl can dream.

Instead, we cower under our brolly while Maddie fumbles with a set of keys. We tumble through the front door, a whirlwind jumble of skirts and bags and stinging sleet. It isn’t a dignified entrance, but no one is home to see it, so we shall just pretend that it hasn’t happened at all.

“Well, here we are then.” Maddie gestures at the inside of the house. She stands up straight and tries hopelessly to straighten out her skirt, but all she does is spray water droplets across the floor. We both look a right mess and there’s not much point in trying to save our looks now. Maddie takes a few tentative steps through the front of the house, calling out a _hello_ to see if there is in fact a welcoming party for us. With no answer, she comes back to me, seemingly unconcerned about the absence of her family. “Grandad must be at the shop. Gran’s likely at market, or at tea with a friend. They’ll both be back eventually. I’m sure they’re dying to meet me.” She eyes our bags and the water dripping from our clothes into steady puddles on the floor, and she sighs. “Come along, then, let’s get settled in.”

Maddie leads me up a crooked flight of stairs, narrating the cheery little slices of life tacked up along the way. Here’s a photo of Maddie and some girls from school; there’s one of Maddie and her grandad on her sixteenth birthday, her prized motorbike propped up in front of the pair. The stairs creak under our feet, the whole house groaning with age and exhaustion. Maddie apologizes as we go, for all the little things: the dust lurking at the edge of the hallway, the crack running up the wall, the threadbare quilt on the bed that will be mine for the next few days. She’s so shy and downtrodden about it all that I want to shake her.

In fact, I _do_ shake her, just a bit, as we stand in front of the small, wobbly guest bed. I put my hands on her shoulders and give her a little rattle. “Now see here, Margaret Brodatt,” I say, putting on my best _Lady Julia Lindsay MacKenzie Wallace Beaufort-Stuart_ voice, the full weight of the title and the names at my service. “Your house is just fine and I thank you very much for the accommodations and you can just stop right now with all this nonsense worrying.”

Her eyes get big and she practically snaps to attention the second I say her name. Maddie may not have been born to be a soldier but she’s adapted fairly well so far, if I do say so myself. “I just worried, that it wouldn’t be enough, with what you’re used to...”

“The _barracks_?” I ask incredulously.

“No, the _castle_.”

I don’t want to dismiss her worries, because she’s right in a way. I am used to things being ever more posh than this. But she’s wrong, because I stopped caring about that ages ago. There _is_ a war on, after all. “Yes, yes, I know, but Maddie...” I pause and push her shoulders a bit, and she folds to sit on the bed, just as I intended. I lower myself to sit next to her and lean up against her side. “The important thing is that we have a few glorious days of freedom, where you don’t have to ferry some of our _charming_ boys around, and we get to be together here. I don’t care about the dust or the peeling plaster or the quilt, Maddie, and you shouldn’t, either. We’re going to have fun, make the best of it and all that. No more complaining.”

As far as rousing battle speeches, it isn’t my finest, but it gets Maddie to smile more. She rests her head on my shoulder for just a few moments and we sit there, in Maddie’s grandparents’ guest room, leaned up against each other, not a care in the world. I imagine she’s preparing an argument in her head, and then discarding it before I even have the chance to talk her out of it. 

I can be quite persuasive; it is my job, after all. 

* 

“Come on, get up.”

I groan. I do not want to get up. I am not on any job of any sort and in fact I took these three days leave due to the fact that the weather is too miserable to even bother to pretend to be getting anything done, and therefore I should not have to be out of bed for any reason other than an air raid or Hitler himself coming to tell us what’s what.

I roll over and pull the blanket over my head and try to ignore the light that’s been unceremoniously turned on. It’s a losing battle, though, because shortly, the bed creaks and wobbles with added weight and the blanket gets wrenched away from me. There's a mess of black curls in my field of vision; Maddie, of course, determined to wake me up.

"No," I say, fumbling for the blankets. "No, can't make me."

"The weather's supposed to clear up this afternoon," she says, stripping the bed entirely of the quilt that had been keeping me warm and keeping that dastardly light away from my eyes. "I want to go for a ride, so get up, out of bed."

“A ride?” I roll over, shielding my eyes from the light as I squint up at Maddie. “The weather’s not clear enough to fly, what are you talking about?”

“On the _motorbike_ ,” she clarifies. I can’t see her, because I’ve shut my eyes again, but I can imagine her rolling her eyes. I hear rustling from off in the corner; it’s Maddie, going through my overnight bag and pulling out clothes for me to wear. “Just up over the hills. We’ll pack a lunch and hope it clears up. Grandad came home with some petrol specifically so we could go out for a bit.”

For as insistent as I can be, Maddie’s twice that whenever she’s made up her mind. I might outrank her but she’s dead stubborn whenever she knows what she wants, and today, Maddie wants to go on a motorbike ride. She’s even dragged her poor grandad in on the whole scheme. Perhaps I need to have _words_ with him.

“Alright, alright,” I grumble, sitting up. I tug the quilt around my shoulders and huddle into it. “Just give me a minute or two to make myself presentable, before we go outside and ruin it all in this dreadful weather.” Someone around here has to care about her looks, and I'm used to it being me. Maddie is used to being smudged with oil, her hair windswept and tangled and all of that.

She leaves me to my own devices, muttering something about tinkering with the engine before we leave. She starts talking about parts and bits and tools and I'm utterly lost, it's just as bad as if she'd asked me to find my way back from here. Hopeless, and we both know it. So Maddie goes to do what she does best, and I dress myself. Nothing I've brought is suitable for motorbiking in the rain, which I don't believe will let up for a single second, but I'll let Maddie have those thoughts of hers. Someone needs to be optimistic around here, and it can't always be me. 

Soon enough, I'm huddling under my coat while Maddie pulls the motorbike around. "This is a terrible idea," I call out to her. She pretends not to hear -- I know she hears me full well, she's just being sneaky now -- and rolls it to a stop in the front of the house. 

"Come on, now," she says, hopping onto the motorbike. For a moment, I can pretend she's getting ready to go on a flight, with her hair pulled back and goggles high up on her forehead. Sleet pelts down on her and runs down her nose, beads up on her eyelashes. "Hop on." She pats the space on the seat behind her. I must make a face, probably the same one I make whenever I used to have to think about flying. "It will be _fun_." She hasn't turned over the engine yet, so as I approach, I pretend that we're simply sharing a bicycle. A very large bicycle.

"If you insist," I say. I eye up the motorbike. It's an enemy, an obstacle to be overcome, and I am not going to let this thing win. Gingerly, I hoist myself onto the contraption, ignoring the way my skirt rucks up about my legs. Maddie's has, too, and it'd be scandalous if there were anyone around to see. Besides, anyone who would want to have _words_ with us -- well, they simply don't know who they're up against. Maddie's quite formidable on her own, even if she'd never believe it to hear it.

"Hang on tight," Maddie instructs, reaching back and tapping my thigh with her free hand. "Arms 'round my waist. The road's pretty shoddy in places, don't want to lose track of you." Think what a shame that would be, I get bounced right off this motorbike, bruised dignity and all. Well, I'm none too keen on that happening, so I cling tight to Maddie. As she starts up the motorbike’s engine, I startle a little, unused to having that sort of nonsense going on underneath me. I tighten my grip and press my face against her back.

“Smooth driving now, Brodatt,” I command, and then we’re off. The rain and the overcast nature should make this a miserable ride, but for some reason, once we start roaring down the hills of Stockport, I’ve stopped thinking about how I’m wet and sore and absolutely bloody freezing. I don’t want to be having a good time, but these hills are majestic, even in this awful weather. I’m to be biased towards Scotland, of course, and so I’d never admit this to another living soul, but even shrouded in clouds, with the sleet pelting us from all angles, but right then, with my arms tight around my best friend, I think Stockport’s the most beautiful place I’ve seen in my entire life.

Maddie’s starting to make more sense to me now, that I’ve seen the home she grew up in, met her grandparents, and now, am clutching to her for dear life as we rip around corners, bound up and down over hilltops.

We’re not flying, but it’s close.

As we come to the crest of a hill, the clouds part and for just the briefest of moments, the sun shines. The sleet doesn’t let up -- of course it doesn’t, why would it? -- but the sky is bright and clear and Maddie laughs, a great whoop as she speeds up and for a moment, I’d swear we took flight as we speed over the hill. I find myself laughing along with her, with my face pressed against Maddie’s neck. I don’t know if my face is wet from the sleet or from tears, but I suppose it doesn’t really matter.

Maybe Maddie was always destined to be a pilot. I don’t know what that says about me, of course, if we’re doing the work we’re _supposed_ to be doing, but Maddie -- this is what she was always supposed to be doing. Not munitions or the cotton mill or even running the wireless, but this: soaring, laughing, living. 

_Flying_.

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Andrew Bird's song "Lusitania".
> 
> Hope you enjoyed!


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